The Ashes of Worlds

by Kevin J. Anderson

  “Impressive enough, but when those ships go into actual battle, the rules of engagement won’t have anything to do with fancy dance moves.”

  Jora’h looked at the bearded man. At one time he would have disagreed out of sheer pride, but now he nodded slowly. “Adar Zan’nh has been learning to adapt. But who has a training program to fight the faeros? This is a new kind of war for us.”

  “For all of us, by damn.”

  They peered into the bottomless pit of calm clouds. Out there, Jess Tamblyn and Cesca Peroni flitted about the cloud tops in their silvery vessel, coalescing water droplets and then flying back to the skymine.

  The wental vessel returned to the open launching bay to deposit a large spill of energized water they had retrieved from the atmosphere. “This should be enough to make a few dozen more ice projectiles,” Jess said, emerging from his shimmering ship with Cesca.

  The liquid flowed out onto the scuffed metal floor, and the wentals seemed to know what to do. The spreading puddle separated itself into smaller globules that formed pointed cylinders and then, in a flash of curling white steam, they spontaneously froze into icy artillery shells.

  Kellum called a work team that used insulated gloves and tongs to distribute the frozen shells among the ships near the skymine, and Jess and Cesca flew off again to draw more traces of wentals from the clouds. By the time the ships were ready to go find the faeros, they would all be fully armed.

  While the activities carried on all around them, Nira sent telink messages through her treeling to inform the Confederation of the plans the allies were making to fight the faeros on Ildira.

  Jora’h felt satisfied. “We have waited a long time for this. And I am glad, very glad, that I maintained my faith in the Confederation and the Roamers, rather than trusting Chairman Wenceslas.”

  A cargo vessel loaded with hundreds of the new projectiles lumbered off across the sky to deliver them to the other skymines. Adar Zan’nh had already sent specifications to Kotto Okiah, so the Roamer engineer could create frozen wental shells for use in Ildiran projectile launchers. Soon, the Solar Navy would be armed with them as well.

  Osira’h moved closer to the edge of the open platform and pointed upward. “Look.”

  High above the skymine, a single bright shape streaked alone across the sky, like a meteor that did not burn up. Behind it came another crackling ball . . . and dozens more, like a shower of incandescent sparks.

  Jora’h instantly realized what he was seeing. His braid whipped and thrashed of its own volition. “So, Rusa’h has found me after all.”

  Nira’s eyes widened. “Did he track one of the warliners? Or did he locate you somehow through the thism?”

  Two more flaming ellipsoids streaked past, followed by another dozen. Flashes raced above the upper fringes of Golgen’s sky in a rain of fire.

  “Doesn’t matter how — they’re here,” Kellum said.

  The Solar Navy ships abandoned their complex exercises and quickly arranged themselves into genuine battle formations. Alarms began to sound. The skymine’s intercom flooded with an overlapping cacophony of shouts. Kellum ran to the wall and slapped the transmit button. “I’m on my way. Tell Kotto he’s getting a chance to test those wental popsicles.” He turned to Jora’h, his face flushed. “The faeros blew up the whole Moon trying to get to you, Mage-Imperator. I doubt they’ll show any more restraint here.”

  Jora’h knew he was right. “No, they will try to destroy everything.”

  116

  Tasia Tamblyn

  The vanguard of fireballs left a roiling wake of hot gases and thermal ripples across Golgen’s sky. Having seen the faeros arrive, some of the skyminers were already evacuating. The flaming ellipsoids streaked after anything that moved.

  Inside Kellum’s skymine, Tasia slid down ladders, dodged stored cargo crates and industrial equipment, and raced across the deck to the lower hangar bay where she had left her cargo hauler. She was already kicking herself for not bringing a military-grade vessel with her, just to cover the bases, but she would make do. At least the ship was equipped with the standard new armaments and improved hull plating supplied by the Confederation.

  Surrounded by the clamor of alarms, Kotto huffed down to the hangar deck to board the ship. He arrived red-faced and winded, but he was actually smiling! “At last, a chance to test the new wental weapons.”

  With a sweep of her arm, Tasia encouraged him to get inside as soon as she extended the ramp. “And they’d better work. We launch in two minutes. No time to waste.”

  Orli Covitz and Hud Steinman had followed Kotto from the workroom, where the three of them had been fiddling with the Klikiss Siren. Tasia was anxious to test that device, as well — but it sure as shizz wasn’t going to be today.

  “Are we evacuating?” Steinman asked.

  Tasia turned. “Not a chance. We’re going to fight those bastards with everything Kotto’s got.”

  “You should stay here, Orli,” the old man said, sounding a bit too paternal. “It’ll be safer.”

  The teenager rolled her eyes. “What, exactly, is safe about being on a skymine that’s under attack?”

  “Good point.”

  Kotto looked back into the hangar bay. “Are the compies coming?”

  “They’re not very good at running,” Orli said. “I’m sure they’ll be here in a few minutes.”

  “We can’t wait,” Tasia shouted over the roar of her engines, which she was already warming up. “Get in, or stay behind. This ship is leaving now.” They all decided to scramble aboard.

  When the hatch was sealed, the Confederation cargo hauler streaked away from the skymine, and they instantly found themselves in a fury of faeros, like ricocheting sparks. Steinman and Orli let out astonished gasps as Tasia pulled the ship in a tight corkscrew to evade a gout of fire; Kotto was so busy checking his system status with the ice-projectile launchers that he didn’t seem to notice.

  “The wental shells are ready,” he announced. “I rigged a refrigerated magazine and loaded the shells onto this ship and eighteen others. We each have ten projectiles. Let’s see how effective they are.”

  “Ten projectiles each?” Tasia indicated all the blazing ellipsoids. “Don’t you think you underestimated a little?”

  He flushed. “Well, it was originally meant for defense, and the faeros usually attack with only a few fireballs at a time. When Speaker Peroni asked me, it seemed a reasonable assumption.”

  Hundreds of Solar Navy warliners descended from orbit in a mind-boggling defensive array, led by Tal Ala’nh. Though it was an extremely impressive show of force, Tasia wasn’t certain the warliners were prepared to face the faeros. She switched on the comm. “Stay clear, Solar Navy — we’re going to try out the new projectiles.”

  Tal Ala’nh’s gruff voice came over the channel. “We may not have your specialized armaments, but we will fight, not cower behind you.”

  “For whatever good that’ll do,” Tasia muttered. As three warliners charged forward in a foolish and suicidal offensive, she sent another communication burst. “Shizz, don’t waste your ships! They’re going to be destroyed.”

  The fireballs flared brighter, racing to intercept the ornate vessels. When she contacted Adar Zan’nh in the main force of warliners, however, he did not order the tal to have his ships retreat. The Ildiran commander’s face looked tired and haggard on the small screen in Tasia’s cockpit. “It is what they feel they need to do to protect the Mage-Imperator.”

  Exactly as Tasia had predicted, the trio of warliners crashed into the flaming ellipsoids, ineffectually firing their weapons until the moment of their destruction. The exploding Ildiran ships released a shockwave that hammered back into the faeros, disrupting the integrity of those particular fireballs, though they soon reformed into a roiling mass. As far as Tasia could tell, the Ildiran sacrifice accomplished little.

  “Our turn,” Orli said.

  Tasia aligned the targeting cross on her screen and drove the c
argo hauler toward the nearest fireball. Flickering, ragged flames wreathed the oncoming faeros as they grew closer, hotter. “Here goes nothing.” She launched the frozen projectile, subconsciously holding her breath.

  The pointed cylinder streaked out and vanished into the heart of the vastly larger fireball. The flames twisted, knotted, and swallowed all trace of the frozen artillery shell.

  Kotto seemed embarrassed. “I, uh, expected something a little more . . . dramatic.”

  With an eruption of white steam, a detonation tore apart the fireball’s nucleus, expanding outward in a cold, moist cloud that engulfed and smothered the flames. When the flash dissipated, nothing remained — no faeros, no wental, just an empty clot of superheated air in the sky.

  “Nine ice bullets left . . . and about a million fireballs out there,” Steinman said.

  “Dive toward another one!” Orli said. “We’re wasting time.”

  Exuberant, Kotto took the communication controls and urged the eighteen other Roamer ships to launch their frozen projectiles. “It works — I encourage you all to try it!”

  Tasia headed toward a faeros and shot their second icy artillery shell. One more fireball annihilated. Altogether, the clan ships on Golgen had nearly two hundred of the special shells. Maybe it would be enough to make a dent and turn back the faeros. As far as she could tell, they had no other weapons that were even remotely effective.

  Her third icy projectile created yet another spectacular cold flash that extinguished a faeros. “I can start enjoying this. Your artillery is a success, Kotto — I just wish I had a full battery of them.”

  Now, more Roamer ships flew into the chaos of fireballs, launching their own frozen projectiles. Numerous flaming ellipsoids were extinguished, leaving behind flashes of dying light.

  Down below, skimming over the cloud tops, Tasia could see the watery vessel flown by her brother and Cesca, rallying the wentals in the atmosphere, pulling curls of mist higher into the sky. She expended her fourth projectile, and Orli and Steinman let out a cheer.

  When the enraged fireballs hurtled toward them, though, she knew for certain they didn’t have enough ammunition.

  117

  Osira’h

  From where they stood inside the large bay, looking out at the landing deck and the open sky, Osira’h and the others watched several warliners being destroyed in their attempts to fight back. The daring Roamer ships flew about, and their icy projectiles were having some effect, but their numbers could not possibly be sufficient. The fireballs kept coming.

  Adar Zan’nh’s voice called out on the open channel of the Mage-Imperator’s small communication device, “Liege, will you remain on the skymine, or do you wish to be brought up to the flagship? I do not know which gives you a better guarantee of safety.”

  “There is no guarantee of safety.” Jora’h glanced at Kellum, then responded briskly. “However, the Roamers will have a better chance if I do not remain among them. Rusa’h wants me. Send a cutter to retrieve us.” He gestured to Nira and their daughter to come with him.

  Osira’h, though, turned toward the small diamond derelict. “No, there is one other chance.” She knew it in her heart, even though none of the others were willing to consider the idea. “And by now we must be desperate enough to take it.”

  The hydrogues had caused much damage to so many planets, including the Ildiran Empire, but Osira’h had been linked with them. She had confronted them, formed a bridge, used her mind as well as her connection to the telink and the thism to force them to listen to her. She had touched their thoughts, and she knew how much they hated the faeros.

  Nira’s eyes widened. “It’s too dangerous.”

  But Osira’h broke away from them and sprinted over to the small diamond sphere. The ship would fall into the depths by itself, but she needed to get it away from the skymine . . . just the slightest nudge would send it over the edge of the launching deck.

  Jora’h’s ornate robes fluttered in the thin air of the open deck. He shouted, “No, Osira’h! I cannot ask you to do this again.”

  Osira’h scrambled through the hatch and paused just for a second to answer him. “You did not ask — I chose.”

  As her parents ran after her, Del Kellum called out, “What the hell does that girl think she’s doing?”

  Osira’h sealed the transparent hatch just as her mother reached the hull. She couldn’t look at Nira, but instead hurried to the lumpy crystalline controls. She had no idea how to fly the craft, remembered only a few glimpses of thoughts from the hydrogues. But all she needed to do was activate the engines, give the sphere a nudge. She would never be able to guide it . . . gravity would have to do the rest.

  An explosion rumbled across the sky. Jora’h and Nira stood pleading outside the transparent hull, but she couldn’t hear them. Instead, her small hands danced over the controls, trying to interpret them, searching for anything that made sense. One of the panels lit up, and though Osira’h heard nothing, she sensed a faint vibration. She tried similar controls, and finally felt a burst of power, a brief pulse from the alien engines.

  The transparent sphere moved forward, began to roll as if someone had given it a shove across the smooth deck toward the precipitous drop-off. Her mother and father could not stop it. Faeros and Roamer ships streaked by overhead.

  Osira’h steeled herself as she glanced out at the firestorm in the skies. It had not been so long since she’d established a link with the hydrogues and used the power of the verdani to coerce them. She had been raised and trained to do this, and she could do it again. Through the thism, the Mage-Imperator would know she remained alive.

  And then she was over the edge. The derelict dropped like a stone away from the giant city in the sky. As she fell, Osira’h peered through the transparent ceiling and saw Nira and Jora’h still shouting, still reaching out for her.

  She watched the gigantic skymine and the frenzied battle dwindle in the distance far above her. Then gauzy clouds engulfed her, and she felt claustrophobic and alone.

  118

  Patrick Fitzpatrick III

  Patrick managed to send out four more subversive broadcasts before Hansa troops stormed the mansion. He knew the resources Basil Wenceslas could bring to bear against them — especially now that the Chairman was infuriated. He had used relays to cover their origin. He thought he was clever. He thought he was safe.

  He was wrong.

  Though Wenceslas certainly had far more pressing problems, he ruthlessly prosecuted anyone who criticized him, never mind the facts. And, of course, he bore a particular grudge against anybody claiming to represent Freedom’s Sword. Patrick was definitely in the crosshairs.

  The worldwide panic and continuing threat of meteor strikes had plunged the population into near anarchy, and they took up the cry against the Chairman with great fervor. Although King Rory made plenty of impassioned speeches, he fooled no one; in fact, since the destruction of the Moon and the horrendous meteor impacts that followed, not many people listened to him anymore.

  With the arrival of King Peter and his cavalry of Confederation rescuers, there could be no better time for a change of government. Patrick felt he was making real progress, but protests could accomplish only so much. Still, that didn’t stop him and Zhett. Thanks to his grandmother’s connections and finances, he had a powerful platform, if only for a little while. He rather enjoyed being a folk hero, but he knew he had to be living on borrowed time.

  With external sensors and automatic alarms, he made his preparations to slip away at the first sign of danger, and in that he made his most serious mistake.

  Since only he and Zhett were in the mansion, he was astonished by the size of the force arrayed against them: four hundred uniformed troops, fourteen low-altitude gunships, six land assault vehicles. He had expected at least a few minutes of warning, but the cleanup crew came in like a blitzkrieg. In the first minute, a projectile blew up the Gypsy where it sat on the small private landing pad; repeated explosions
wiped out the adjacent hangar and all of Maureen’s vehicle bays. The space yacht had been primed and ready to go, but now it was only a smoldering lump of wreckage. He and Zhett had counted on eluding pursuit with their Roamer-augmented engines. Now, his Plans B, C, and D had also been cut off. The Chairman’s goons were very thorough.

  “Sorry I got you into this,” he said to Zhett as the troops swarmed around the mansion, smashing windows and breaking in through every possible entrance. They shot projectiles at the walls with loud rifles, apparently to intimidate them.

  She pretended to be unfazed. “Listen, if you had left me behind, you’d be in a lot more trouble than you are with these people.”

  The troops found them together in the media room behind a barricaded door. The moment he accepted the impossibility of escape, Patrick had decided to transmit the whole assault live, so that people could witness the antics of the cleanup crew. More fodder for the protests. He hoped, but was not convinced, that the Hansa soldiers might exercise more restraint if they knew their actions were being broadcast. But Chairman Wenceslas was past caring about public outrage. People might well scream, but he did as he pleased.

  When the dark-uniformed soldiers broke down the door and stormed the media room, Patrick was surprised to see that the assault group was led by a zealous Shelia Andez, now sporting a colonel’s rank insignia. She seemed barely able to keep herself from spitting in his face. “You’re a disgrace to your oath of service, your government, and your people.”

  “Funny, I was about to say the same.” Patrick faced his former comrade in arms. “If you paid attention to what the Hansa is really doing, you wouldn’t cooperate. Open your eyes.”

  Zhett let out a bitter laugh at the suggestion. “She knows damned well what’s going on, Fitzie. This is the bitch who’s doing most of it!”